THE 20 YEAR OLD unemployed daughter of the jailed drug dealer, Tony Felloni, has been remanded in custody for sentence after pleadings guilty to a heroin supply charge.
Regina Felloni became involved in drugs after her father's release from prison in 1993, Garda Seamus Boland told Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
Garda Boland said she had £50,000 in a bank account one of a number of Felloni family accounts recently frozen by the High Court, and she used cash to buy and renovate a house in Finglas. She also paid cash for a £6,000 1994 Nissan car and had a £350 mobile phone. Her seven convictions before 1993 were mainly for shoplifting.
Judge Cyril Kelly said financial institutions had an obligation to society when young unemployed people like Felloni could lodge such large sums of money. She had £50,000 in one account and a blind eye appeared to have been turned. He said this facilitated the wrong just as much as the neighbour who did not complain about known wrong doings next door.
Mr Shane Murphy, prosecuting, said the High Court had frozen Felloni family assets of more than £100,000, including the house at Mellowes Road, Finglas owned by the defendant. More details of these matters will be disclosed at the sentence hearing on November 18th.
Felloni pleaded guilty to having heroin for sale or supply on April 2nd. The heroin was 40 per cent pure with a £30,000 street value.
Garda Boland said her arrest came during "Operation Pizza" the code name for a campaign organised by the Dublin north central divisional drugs unit to target the Felloni family.
As a result of confidential information and inquiries, gardai raided the accused woman's Finglas home. Simultaneously he and Garda Darragh O'Toole began searching a house in Hollybank Road, Drumcondra, where Felloni had rented a small bedsit eight months previously using the name "Rose Moloney".
Garda Boland said it was vacant hen the search began but after about a minute Felloni admitted herself with her own keys.
The heroin was found in packs in two coffee jars. Scales and other items including surgical gloves and plastic bags were also recovered. Some of these were in a small attic over the shower unit. Cash totalling £1,000 was also found. Felloni admitted the heroin was hers.
She said she told the landlord she was working but did not say at what. She paid £35 a week rent and had stayed there about eight times.
She claimed she was under pressure "from a chap who is in prison" to sell the heroin to clear a debt. She said "You don't mess with this fellow" and further claimed he had people watching her. Garda Boland said he did not accept a word of this.
Garda Boland said there was no mortgage on the Mellowes Road house. Felloni told gardai she did not know how much it cost or how much was paid to renovate it. She also said it was owned by her and her grandfather.
Felloni was single and unemployed and was living at the time in the Mellowes Road house with her boyfriend. She said she abused heroin and cocaine.
Garda Boland agreed with Mr Garnet Orange, defending, that she became involved in drugs after her father was released from a drugs sentence in 1993.
Mr Orange said she came from an unenviable background. Given that, she could hardly have finished up any other way than she had. The question arose of how much of an influence her father's release from prison had on her.
Judge Kelly said the mental conflict in a young child who clearly knew that what her father was doing was illegal, and was told to do likewise, must be great. But the defendant was no longer a child. He accepted the release of her father in 1993 might have had an effect on her.
Felloni's father, Tony (53), was recently jailed for 20 years for drug dealing in 1994 and 1995. Her brother, Luigi (23), is in custody awaiting sentence on October 10th for similar offences. A CLAIM by a Co Clare solicitor for £30,000 damages against the AIB has been struck out by Judge Patrick Smith in the Circuit Civil Court on the grounds it had already been compromised by his acceptance of a £1,000 "goodwill" offer from the bank.
Mr John Devane, of Linnane Terrace, Kilrush Road, Ennis, had sued the bank following an alleged wrongful invalidation of his Visa card while shopping with his fiancee in a fashion store in Bangkok, Thailand, last year.
He claimed he and his fiancee had to wait for seven hours in Ambassador Fashions, Bangkok, until authorisation for a transaction came through.
He also claimed he was financially embarrassed in front of his fiancee and her parents, whom he was visiting in Australia, by having to borrow money while he awaited the arrival of an emergency card.
Mr Martin Hayden, counsel for AIB, told the court that Mr Richard Raftery, assistant manager of the bank's Cardholder Services, had written to Mr Devane in June last year apologising for the incident and enclosing a £1,000 cheque as a gesture of goodwill for inconvenience, annoyance and embarrassment caused.
Mr Hayden said Mr Raftery had spoken to Mr Devane when he returned from holiday and Mr Devane had suggested that payment of £1,000 would be acceptable in full settlement of his complaint. The cheque had been cashed on June 14th, 1995.
As a solicitor he was well aware of the consequences of the nomination of a figure for settlement and the acceptance of that sum upon payment.